I’ve always had the thought that anything that was fast immediately qualified it as being cool. I think I have tried to really live by that here at BangShift over the course of the nearly 12,000 blog items I have published on the site but over the last couple of weeks I have gotten an amazing perspective into how true that statement rings for me personally and I am wondering if it does the same for you. It has been a wild summer between all of the content we have been slamming here at BangShift, the interesting side trips I have taken for ECTA land speed races, diesel truck events, NHRA drag races, media gatherings, and other assorted fun as well.

For example, in the span of seven days last week I went from operating a land speed meet (with my wife, Keith, and Tonya Turk along with the ECTA’s awesome volunteers), riding in a rally car with Ken Block, driving a new Corvette Z06 and a Porsche on the same day, and finally spending three days at the Lucas Oil Drag Racing Series regional event at New England Dragway. A few weeks back Nutting and I got to horse around with a Hellcat, we cruised a new Mustang GT convertible to the Ken Block event, and I actually kind of stumbled into an opportunity to ride shotgun in a stock car around Bristol Motor Speedway for about a dozen laps when I was there calling the drag races. That is a pretty wide freaking swath of the speed realm and I can tell you that each experience was as different and fun as the next. They were all linked by one thing…speed.

There are people in the automotive world that have a singular focus and when it comes to being a professional in a discipline, I think that is the only way to go. If your job is to make a stock car go faster, by all means love stock cars and only stock cars until the cows come home. I think that regular people like you and me who love cars really pigeon hole themselves when they get hung up about liking one thing and hating or disparaging all else. Just because you love drag racing doesn’t mean you have to hate stock car racing.

I certainly do not pay super close attention to NASCAR but when the opportunity arose to take a golf car over to Bristol Motor Speedway with Alan Reinhart on the weekend we were calling the NHRA Thunder Valley Nationals, I jumped at it. I had only seen the place on television and when we drove into the infield on the golf cart it was like walking into Fenway Park for the first time. It took my breath away. I had no conception of how steep the banking was or anything. When the guy operating the rent a ride stock car stuff gave us permission to lap the track on the golf cart, Alan and I got that baby up to speed and actually took the high line around the place and cheated death. Pulling back into the pits to thank the guy who gave us permission, he noticed our NHRA shirts and offered us a firesuit and a helmet each. We both jumped at the chance and next thing you know we were ripping around the place in the passenger seat of ex-NASCAR Cup cars (with way less powerful small blocks in them) and loving every second. That was an amazing experience and it was astounding to think about the endurance necessary to do it for 500 miles on that bullring of a track. The sensation of speed there was totally in the corners. The course just kind of folds over on itself and you get compressed into the seat, even at the speeds we were traveling which were well below that of the actual machines you see on television.

Speed in the land racing realm is a relative thing as well. Seeing someone break 120mph for the first time in a little car that maybe went 80 from the factory is thrilling. Seeing someone on a 50cc motorcycle break the highway speed limit in a mile is enough to make the whole place cheer an an effort like that is as valid and valuable as someone trying to go 500 on the salt flats. It is the same game of beating physics that everyone is playing, some just on a larger scale than others. It is really a pleasure to provide a venue for people to chase their definition of fast, whatever it may be.

There is a machismo around speed, likely because of the dangers that go up and the speeds increase but take the Hellcat for example. Having had that car for about a week and put hundreds of miles on it, I pretty much determined that it was the most violent car that Detroit had ever produced…and then I met the new Corvette Z06. I’ll be providing a more in-depth story on the Corvette this week but the reality is that the Corvette with all the stuff turned off is even nastier than the Hellcat is and it can do things laterally that the Hellcat could not dream of. Whether any of us will ever admit it or not, the reality is that when you are rolling around in a car like the Hellcat you feel 14-feet tall, bulletproof, and like the master of your own universe. The same goes for the Z06 with the added knowledge that you can take on some of the world’s best stuff in the bends as well. Completely different stuff than the stock cars or the land speed racers but equally cool. The Porsche I was able to cruise on the same day as the Z06 was a new 911 Targa 4S. I drove it after the Corvette and with 250 less hp, it was not the same beastly thing as the Corvette was but after a few miles it was clear that that car had some advantages over the Vette. The PDK transmission is insanely awesome, it was more comfortable, and in some ways it was a little more fun. Lots of people may call me names for saying that I enjoyed spending time in a Porsche but I’m not really sure that I care. Again, fast is cool and that thing had stones for sure.

The time I spend at the drag races is big fun and honestly where I feel most at home. I know the most about it, I like seeing the different ways guys have built and designed cars to compete in various classes and most of all I like the competition. I like the fact that if two F-stock automatic cars line up, it is a heads up race and someone has to prove that they have more in the tank than the other guy. I love that element and I even enjoy the competitive and precision elements of classes that many people forego. You may hate Super Comp but there has to be one grudging nerve somewhere in your body that thinks it is OK to admit that seeing cars running a single four barrel carb on top of 600ci and blasting the traps at 180mph is pretty cool, right? Fast is cool and that is fast.

Finally there was the rally experience (you will hear and see lots more of this in the coming days) that I got to participate in last week thanks to an invite for Ford. Nutting and I went to the Team O’Neil driving school in New Hampshire and we both got to experience what it was like to ride in full-on professional rally cars. We have shown hundreds of rally videos over the years and lots of them involved crashes to I was thinking that I was in for it, but the reality is that it was likely the greatest gearhead experience of my life. Riding in those cars actually educated me more as we hurtled through the woods than any other single thing could have about rally cars and drivers. It was a sport that I was woefully lacking in applicable knowledge in and when I left I pretty much vowed to myself to try and do more to support the scene here in the USA because it is a mind blowing form of racing perpetrated by a mind blowing form of race car that I now fully appreciate.

The one thing I have learned over the thousands of items here is that the second I think I “know” something I likely do not. From day one I have always professed my love of all things that use tires and burn combustible fuel no matter their shape and size and I have always tried to keep the content and things I generate interesting, informative, and fun. If I have gotten one person or even three people to open their horizons on the automotive world, I’d consider that a big success. The gearhead world we live in is filled with awesome people, awesome machines, and awesome sports that do not need to be pigeonholed or marginalized. I am eternally fortunate to lead the life that I do and take part in this stuff. Doing my best to somehow take you along for as much of the adventure as I possibly can is my sworn duty. The only thing I need from you is a pledge to stick with me, even if we’re going to a place you’ve never been before.

As always, thanks for reading.